The Eucharist - Real Presence or Symbolic?

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This is a carry-over of the topic on April’s thread. Let’s discuss the Real Presence in the Eucharist and Protestant challenges to it…
 
If God can become man, why not bread. It isn’t a problem for God.
 
Did Jesus Christ said “this is the symbol of my BODY”?:nope:

Definitely it is not symbolic.
 
Anyone who doubts the presence of our beloved Lord in the Eucharist put the following in your search engine -the eucharistic miracle of lanciano. It will take you to the website in Italy to the church where this miracle is kept. You can see the actual heart tissue that was seen under a microscope which was taken from this host !
I saw this church this past January on pilgrimage and got up close to the miracle it self. It’s true, it’s real and it’s a fact !!!

Tunemiester:amen:
 
Reading John Chapter 6 sums it all up for me.

“This is my body, this is my blood”.

Jesus speaks. I listen. Some had trouble believing His words though, especially because of the laws the Jews had about drinking blood, all the more reason to believe, because Jesus was not just trying to stir trouble by saying “Drink my blood”.

Jesus says in response to the unbelief: "Since Jesus knew that his disciples were murmuring about this, he said to them, “Does this shock you? … But there are some of you who do not believe.”

Simon Peter answered him, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

And I say to myself, to whom shall I go? Jesus is truth and can only speak truth. I can’t see Jesus in the Eucharist, just like I can’t see Him anywhere around me. But he says He is there, and so I believe His words.
 
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tunemiester:
Anyone who doubts the presence of our beloved Lord in the Eucharist put the following in your search engine -the eucharistic miracle of lanciano. It will take you to the website in Italy to the church where this miracle is kept. You can see the actual heart tissue that was seen under a microscope which was taken from this host !
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id like to see this “heart tissue” or anything that even resembles jesus’s body in any catholic right now. If you looked in ur body right after taking and eating his blood and body you’re going to find the wine and bread in ur system.
 
If there is no real presence in the Eucharist, then how can St.Paul warn us not to take it unworthily lest we become guilty of the body and blood of the Lord? That “spiritualization” makes complete nonsense not only of the 6th chapter of John, but of 1st Corinthians 10:16-17 “16 The chalice of benediction, which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? And the bread, which we break, is it not the partaking of the body of the Lord? 17 For we, being many, are one bread, one body, all that partake of one bread.”

and 11: 23-30

23 For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread. 24 And giving thanks, broke, and said: Take ye, and eat: this is my body, which shall be delivered for you: this do for the commemoration of me. 25 In like manner also the chalice, after he had supped, saying: This chalice is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of me.

26 For as often as you shall eat this bread, and drink the chalice, you shall shew the death of the Lord, until he come. 27 Therefore whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord. 28 But let a man prove himself: and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of the chalice. 29 For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord. 30 Therefore are there many inform and weak among you, and many sleep.

Now, how can one become guilty of the body and blood of the Lord IF THAT BODY AND BLOOD OF THE LORD IS NOT REALLY THERE? Now if I make a symbol of Karl Keating like this symbol here:🙂 and then I decide to do bad things to that symbol symbol…like say this: http://bestsmileys.com/violent/10.gif I may indeed be guilty of abusing that symbol of the goodman Karl Keating, but am I guilty of his body and blood? Silly question…of course not! Why? BECAUSE KARL KEATING IS NOT REALLY PRESENT IN THAT SYMBOL is he?
There is the the whole case for why the Eucharist really is the presence of Our Lord Jesus Christ…body and blood, soul and divinity.
 
I agree with all of the learned answers so far, but on a certain level isn’t the Eucharist both real presence and symbol at the same time? The Catholic Encyclopedia admits that liturgy, including communion, is filled with symbolism (newadvent.org/cathen/14373b.htm)). Moreover, and maybe I am confusing sign and symbol here, but is not a sacrament defined as a sign that presents the grace they signify (CCC 1084)?

So, the eucharist really is in substance the body and blood of Christ, but it is also a symbol of our common meal as Christians (among other things), and it is a sign (bread) that signifies the spiritual nourishment it provides.
 
Vox Borealis:
I agree with all of the learned answers so far, but on a certain level isn’t the Eucharist both real presence and symbol at the same time? The Catholic Encyclopedia admits that liturgy, including communion, is filled with symbolism (newadvent.org/cathen/14373b.htm)). Moreover, and maybe I am confusing sign and symbol here, but is not a sacrament defined as a sign that presents the grace they signify (CCC 1084)?

So, the eucharist really is in substance the body and blood of Christ, but it is also a symbol of our common meal as Christians (among other things), and it is a sign (bread) that signifies the spiritual nourishment it provides.
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Good point. Perhaps I should clarify the title as “Real Presence or Just Symbolic?”
 
Wow,
You were right Eden, no controversey here at all! Okay! First off I wanna say I completely respect the Catholic beliefs,and I am not attacking Catholics. So far the ones, I havemet, are beyond amazing! Yay Catholics! But I dont understand how you guys could not take communion metaphorically. As I’ve said before I believe its a great way of worship…praise God! But what about when Jesus referred to himself as water? Was Jesus literally water? Hmmm I’d have to conclude with no. I’m not implying that everything in the Bible is metaphorical. But I think Jesus did use metaphores to get His point across. When He said I am the bread of life. I believe He said the bread because we need bread to survive(eating is essential to living) , likewise, we need Him.
Well thats my two-bits. Oh and there’s you controversy 😛
 
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april_hosen:
Wow,
You were right Eden, no controversey here at all! Okay! First off I wanna say I completely respect the Catholic beliefs,and I am not attacking Catholics. So far the ones, I havemet, are beyond amazing! Yay Catholics! But I dont understand how you guys could not take communion metaphorically. As I’ve said before I believe its a great way of worship…praise God! But what about when Jesus referred to himself as water? Was Jesus literally water? Hmmm I’d have to conclude with no. I’m not implying that everything in the Bible is metaphorical. But I think Jesus did use metaphores to get His point across. When He said I am the bread of life. I believe He said the bread because we need bread to survive(eating is essential to living) , likewise, we need Him.
Well thats my two-bits. Oh and there’s you controversy 😛
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Tempting, but this line of reasoning fails to convince for a number of reasons.

1] “But I dont understand how you guys could not take communion metaphorically. As I’ve said before I believe its a great way of worship…praise God! But what about when Jesus referred to himself as water? Was Jesus literally water? Hmmm I’d have to conclude with no.”

This is a flawed analogy because you get the metaphor backwards. The question is not whether Christ is literally bread (or water), but whether the bread is Christ’s body and blood. Oh, and by the way, Jn 19.34 reports that when the soldier stabbed Christ’s side, blood and water poured out. So, maybe Jesus’ reference to himself as water (I assume you mean Jn 4.7ff) had a more direct symbolic if not literal resonance.

2] Continuing along the same lines, in Jn 4.13-14 Christ says to the Samaritan woman that he will give water that will provide eternal life. At no point does he make the explicit claim that the water was his flesh or blood, or vice-versa.

Now compare this to Jn 6.22-71, wherein Christ explicilty equates himself with bread, repeatedly and explicity states that we must eat his flesh and drink his blood, and finally states explicitly that the bread he gives us is his flesh (6.51: “The bread I give is my flesh;” 6.52: “How can this man gie us his flesh to eat?” 6.53: “Unless you eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood;” 6.54: “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood;” 6.55: “My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink;” 6.56 “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood.”)

The reaction of those listening (many of whom left), and Christ’s challenge (“Does this shock you?”), combined with the repetition of explicit statesments that we must eat Christ’s flesh, and the equation that the bread Christ gives is his flesh, all suggest very strongly that Christ meant for us to understand him here literally (though, as I noted above, he could also have wanted us to understand him BOTH literally and symbolically/metaphorically at the same time).

3] Finally, then, moving on to the Last Supper–one COULD understand the Christ’s words as mostly if not entirely as metaphor, but ONLY if we reject the context provided in John’s Gospel. And of course, we then add in Paul’s words (as Church Militant has alreaded posted).

Overall, I just don’t any way that a symbolic onl understanding of th eucharist makes the best sense of all the scriptural evidence in context, but the acceptance of the real presence does allow all the evidence to fall into place.
 
Vox Borealis:
3] Finally, then, moving on to the Last Supper–one COULD understand the Christ’s words as mostly if not entirely as metaphor, but ONLY if we reject the context provided in John’s Gospel. And of course, we then add in Paul’s words (as Church Militant has alreaded posted).
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Vox did a great job of presenting a case, but if I could I would like to tack a quick thing on about the “context provided in John’s Gospel”. The context of the Last Supper was Passover. A very important part of Passover is eating the sacrificial lamb. If you don’t see that it’s important, re-read Exo 12! Specific instructions are given (including eating with unleavened bread - hmmph!) as to how you may and how you may not eat the lamb. In Revelations (as well as other books), Jesus is called Lamb some 28 times in 22 chapters. Any significance?

To read more of how the Bible predicted the Eucharist, please visit the thread I linked earlier…I spent a little bit of time on it, and I think it’s pretty good…

Peace,
RyanL
 
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bkniceley:
id like to see this “heart tissue” or anything that even resembles jesus’s body in any catholic right now. If you looked in ur body right after taking and eating his blood and body you’re going to find the wine and bread in ur system.
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It is a spiritual presence. If our Lord turned every piece of flesh and wine at communion to look like his flesh and blood, how many people would drink it? And how EASY would that make it to believe? Blessed are those who have not seen but believed…
 
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tunemiester:
Anyone who doubts the presence of our beloved Lord in the Eucharist put the following in your search engine -the eucharistic miracle of lanciano. It will take you to the website in Italy to the church where this miracle is kept. You can see the actual heart tissue that was seen under a microscope which was taken from this host !
I saw this church this past January on pilgrimage and got up close to the miracle it self. It’s true, it’s real and it’s a fact !!!

Tunemiester:amen:
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Nevertheless, tune, doctrine does not depend on or arise out of these things, which are aids to the faithful but not foundations of dogma.
 
In an article by Msgr. Robert Sokolowski published in an issue of “Homiletics and Pastoral Review” (Winter, 1997) Monsignor makes some cogent points:
. . .to say that in the Eucharist the bread and wine remain what they are but acquire a new signification would contradict the logic of the Incarnation. Christ was not simply a prophet who pointed out the way to the Father; he was the way to the Father. He did not just communicate the truth about God, he was the Word of God. The believer comes to the Father not by the way and the truth that are signified by Christ, but through Christ himself, who is the way, the truth, and the life. Analogously, if the bread and wine were to remain bread and wine, they would point us toward the Death and Resurrection of Christ and toward the Son of God, they would signify him and what he did, but they would not be his presence and the presence of his action among us. The Eucharist would fail to continue, sacramentally, the form of the Incarnation, and we would be deprived of the presence, the bodily presence, of the way, the truth, and the life. The Incarnation would have been withdrawn from the world. . . .
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. . . Protestants who do not believe in the Real Presence view the bread and wine used in the Eucharist to be given additional meaning in the same way. Once the bread and wine is consecrated, the bread takes on the additional meaning of being Christ’s body, and the wine takes on the additional meaning of being Christ’s blood. The bread and wine don’t literally change but instead take on a higher meaning within the context of the sacrament. Once the Eucharist is consumed and the sacrament is complete, the bread and wine lose the additional meanings they had during the ceremony and become simply bread and wine again.
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In the Protestant scenario, then, it would be the community giving meaning to what has occurred, rather than Christ Himself. IOW, “We are doing this to remember Christ and we give this memorial the meaning of His presence among us, which meaning is no longer present when the service is finished” rather than, “Christ accomplishes this personally in the person of the priest, giving Himself without quarter eternally.”
 
AMEN

This simple Latin word should send shivers up the spine.

The word AMEN is one of the cases where a Hebrew word came directly into the Greek and Latin without change. It means TRUTH.

It means - “dude, I’m not kidding.”

Throughout John 6 Jesus said AMEN I SAY TO YOU] to the disciples when they appeared to be taking his words symbolically.

“Dude, your guitar is on fire!”

Yeah, it’s cool.

“No, dude, I’m not kidding - your guitar is on fire.”
 
adnauseum,
I dont know how you got onto the subject of Amen. but hey whatever floats your boat.👍
 
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